Clarifying the Cost of Insurance
Recently, The Cincinnati Enquirer ran an article online about police billing motorists’ insurance companies for the cost to respond to accidents. (Adobe .pdf copy of the article). I don’t think the article did a good job of examining both sides of the issue so I have submitted my letter to the editor, although I doubt it will be printed.
So, what is the article about you ask?! Well it seems the Erlanger, KY police chief wants to charge a fee for officers’ time in order to respond to accidents. The article cites statistics that a majority of the wrecks in Erlanger’s jurisdiction involve people that are not residents of the municipality. I didn’t think it mattered where you were from, if you caused an accident you get a citation. If you get caught speeding, you get a citation. I know plenty of people that have received speeding tickets in their home town as well as other cities and states. If Erlanger does not want to help non-residents because of the cost involved, perhaps it should have the decals on the side of their police cruisers amended to read “To protect and serve our community only.”
The article also addresses (from one side) the notion that you can bill an insurance company for responding to an accident. I don’t see how you can levy fees on motorists that have insurance that will cover such a response but not your own community members as the article suggests that Erlanger will do. If you levy the fee on out of town motorists, you would also need to assess community members.
Here is my letter to the editor, just in case The Enquirer decides not to print it:
In response to the article about charging a response fee to drivers involved in a wreck, I want to clear up an inaccurate statement made by Cost Recovery Corp and also respond to the police chief’s comments.
First, for Cost Recovery Corp to assert that insurance companies cannot raise rates in certain areas and that companies will not increase rates if they’re required to pay first responder fees is simply not true. Any actuary that incorporates those added fees into the rate modeling will in fact use these costs to affect rates. Insurance companies will file with the state for higher rates and justify the rate increase by pointing to the evidence that higher claim dollars are being paid out. Insurance regulators want these companies to remain solvent just as much as they want the market to be competitive. First responder fees affect all of the insurance carriers competing in a given market so this will affect everyone, not just those who have accidents.
Police Chief Marc Fields questioned why his community should fund the cost of his officers responding to accidents. My response is quite simply, “isn’t that what fines and citations are for?” Sure fines are to punish someone for wrongdoing and to deter future behavior, but the fines also help fund the municipal government’s operations. Perhaps Chief Fields should have read the article entitled Don’t Speed Here on the front page of The Enquirer about Arlington Heights being a speed trap. That village also responds to a number of accidents on I-75 that don’t involve its own residents. But that village also actively patrols that stretch of I-75 to deter speeding and issue citations to generate revenue. Unlike adding first responder fees, which drives up insurance cost for everyone in a given area over time, issuing citations drives up insurance cost to those that committed the violation.
As always, I welcome your comments and feedback…